Download From Bill Bryson`s “Shakespeare”

Shakespeare
From Bill Bryson’s “Shakespeare”
“The best and least known of all figures”: after 400 years, only about 100
documents relating to Sh and only 14 words written in his own hand (of which 6 are
signatures)
THE FACTS
1. Baptised 26 April 1564, Stratford-on-Avon: father John a glover but also
a dodgy businessman; mother Mary Arden; Sh the 3rd child of 8. Probably
went to the local grammar school until 15; Latin from Oxford-trained
headmaster but would have been lightly educated.
2. Married Anne Hathaway 1582: she was 8 years older and pregnant. (Girls
could marry aged 12, boys 16!) Birth of Susanna 1583 and twins Judith and
Hamnet 1585.
3. “Lost years” 1585-1592. Then went to London.
4. Actor and writer with growing success 1596-1602 in the Lord
Chamberlain’s Men company.
5. Hamnet d 1596. Returned to Stratford 1597, invested in property. Man oaf
some substance. Coat of arms (but no son and line died out when
granddaughter Elizabeth d 1670).
6. Made a will one month before he died: 2nd best bed to wife but the bulk of
his estate to Susanna.
7. Died 23 Apr 1616.
THE FIRST FOLIO:
Fellow actors Hemmings and Condell collected and tried to restore what they could
find of Sh’s work. Published 1623 but muddly editing by at least 9 different people.
In his lifetime Sh was good but not great.
WHAT’S ODD ABOUT SHAKESPEARE:
1. Almost nothing known about his own emotions/opinions; it’s his characters
who speak, not Sh.
2. We don’t know what went into his work.
3. Left nearly 1 million words in his texts but only 14 in his own hand.
4. No manuscript survives (but only an est. 15% of the writings of his period
have survived).
5. On only a handful of days can we prove where he was.
6. Not mentioned as a playwright until 1592; his life was already half over.
7. Very little was published with his consent in his lifetime.
8. No written description of him in his own lifetime.
Shakespeare
WHAT DID HE LOOK LIKE?
We don’t know; only 3 possible likenesses:
1. The Chandos portait: dark/dirty; Gold earing suggests a racy look and black
clothing suggests wealth (black dye expensive). Only portrait which might
have been taken from life.
2. The Droeshout engraving in the First Folio (the high forehead and lopsided
face one). Done 7 years after his death but it WAS endorsed by actor Ben
Jonson who wrote the Preface too.
3. Monument in Holy Trinity Church in Stratford, but not done until 1623.
SH’S LONDON:
Small: walk across it in an hour: 3 miles E to W; 2 miles N to S.
Lots of tiny parishes. Protestant religion favoured; Catholics tolerated by
Elizabeth 1.
Dirt. Noise. Crime. Brawling. Animal fighting for entertainment.
Plague. Life expectancy 35.
Midday main meal. Beer, even for breakfast.
70% men illiterate; 90% of women
THEATRES:
1. New! Usually in inn yards or halls. First theatre the Red Lion 1567?
2. Only males on stage
3. Regulated by the Master of the Revels: had to be respectful, orderly
4. Dodgy: cutpurses, pickpockets
5. Began 2pm: ran 2-5 hours; only in daylight
6. Publicised by handbills, fanfares, banner(s)
7. Penny for groundlings; 2d for a seat. Day’s wage =12d
8. No one more than 50 feet from the stage
9. Little scenery; no curtains; but elaborate costumes
10. Needed 2000 spectators per day (about 1% of London’s pop.) x 200
performance per year, against stiff competition
11. 5 different plays a week.
12. Closed if plague
13. Plawright not an esteemed profession: 6 pounds per script? Ben Jonson
earned 200 pounds in his lifetime.
WHAT WAS DIFFERENT ABOUT SHAKESPEARE?
1. Reworked old stories and made them better.
2. Something for everyone in his audience: low to high brow.
3. Genius not with facts but with ambition, love intrigue, suffering, “illuminating
the workings of the soul”.
Shakespeare
4. Language: coined over 2000 words, 800 survive today.
5. Phrasemaker! Over 10% of a Dictionary of Quotations is Sh.
6. Superb comedian.
THE PLAYS:
70% blank verse: unrhymed iambic pentameter
5% iambic pentameter
25% prose (not poetry)
An iamb is a foot which goes “Ta DAAAH!”
Pentameter is a line of five iambs.
Followed strict rules for Tragedy (Aristotle’s) but Sh bent the rules at times.
THE SONNETS: Was Sh gay?
1-124: addressed to a fair youth
127-154 addressed to a “dark lady” who was unfaithful to the sonnet writer by
sleeping with the fair youth.
BUT: Were these meant for publication? And who decided in what order they
should go?
Usually sonnets are love poems but some of these are full of self-loathing and great
bitterness
WOULD THE REAL SHAKESPEARE PLEASE STAND UP?
For 200 or so years, Sh’s identity was not questioned. Then some academics began
to wonder if Sh was a stooge for a writer of greater talent. Maybe:
1. Henry Wriothesely (pron. Rizzly), Earl of Southampton; bisexual; Sh’s
patron.
2. Edward De Vere, Earl of Oxford (but d 1604)
3. Sir Francis Bacon
4. William Stanley, Earl of Derby
5. Mary Sidney, Countess of Pembroke
6. A committee of some of these talents/